Don't Believe in Charms

The second greatest gift that God gave man is "common grace." Everything good comes from God and He is not limited in His means or by whom He chooses to use.

The theologian Calvin expressed it thus, "that we... cannot do any thing that is good without thee [God]." Even a non-believer glorifies God by their good intellect and/or the products of their hands. Their skill, music, writing, thoughts, actions, and even that which they don't do is temporarily elevated, allowed to exist in a greater plan of good. 

So... Why do some choose to put the Ichthys on their business cards? Is it in hopes of elevating their work? I find that is hardly the case. Instead, quite the reverse. It is used to lull those that think of the symbol as a charm, a speak-easy knock, the secret knowledge that will ensure an honest job from the person who's card it's on. Only charlatans have need to lull their prey and only the naive should believe it.

"Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by my deeds." I don't need a charm, nor do I care for those who do. Any reminder I carry is for myself.




  

Glass Aquariums

I feel a compulsory need to gain their attention, talk to them, and then... tamp them down, slow their role, control their outbursts. Why?

He came to church. For Easter, he got dressed up and came to the church he remembers. He was late, but, then again, we've changed times since he was there last. He sat next to a guy he knew and we talked during one of the songs. The conversation wandered from a smiled greeting, to the bike trail, to the song we were singing, to the woman up front at the microphone.

He made me nervous. I waited for the tell tail sign that makes our conversations awkward. Sooner or later, the other shoe always drops. It always has. His neural circuitry tends to loop in inappropriate areas and I have to fight the associated embarrassment when the tic comes out.

Why not say it? They make me nervous, but, as people, I find them (him) engaging. As a medical professional, I find them (him) interesting, fascinating.

I had spent the last four days on a family vacation with my daughters and wife. On the second day, we visited the Newport Aquarium and beheld the wonders of the ocean and the swamp: sharks, sting rays, a school of piranhas, a hundred year old snapping turtle, and a twenty-foot alligator. We stood and watched, tried to touch them (behind glass) as I pontificated to the girls about their habitats, life-cycles, wonders... and dangers. It was fun, it was interesting... it was safe.

Standing next to him in church, talking with him, it hit me. Why was I afraid of him? Why was I wasting all of my attention and energy trying to put a tank of glass between him and myself: to better study him? Was I treating him like a wild animal... an animal?

I was! I repented. I still had to actively focus on the worship going on. I had to force myself not to worry, but, for the next hour, I began to enjoy his presence as a fellow believer.

Social norms... the glass tank we swim in. Perhaps the glass tanks at the aquarium aren't just to protect the tourists? They protect the animals too!

Then it hit me again. I wasn't trying to protect him, I was trying to protect myself. He was as broken and forgiven as I am. He still waits and longs to be made whole again with the resurrection, but can't hide behind social norms like I can. He couldn't put on the protection like I could and he wanted to swim in my tank, sit by me, talk to me, and interact on my turf. That's what scared me. Would I have to do the same? Would I have to take down the glass wall between him and I? 

Would the others in church see my untamed side, my viciously unSunday side? The side of me that enjoys a bawdy joke, that enjoys an occasional beer, that connects and (more than that) empathizes with his daily struggle?

Yes and yes.

I still have boundaries, especially with my daughters in the seats beside me, but I did, will, and do want to swim with the other fish.

The first step: I will not be embarrassed. I will deal with it as it comes... if needed, but not before. I will not be "anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving" enjoy the people God puts in my life.

As my older patient's tell me when I ask them, "live life while you can and live it now." Damn the glass tanks!

Forget the Fig Leaf, Gird Yourself Like a Man

Of all the people in history that might have had a reason to complain, I would have given Job the benefit of the doubt. Adam, not so much:

Lone survivors tell of "fire from heaven,... raiding parties, ... [and] a mighty wind from the desert" that destroy everything dear to him.  Job losses his family and everything he owns. His progeny and their inheritance, his portion of Abraham's covenant with God, gone. His outer safety net of relationships go with it.

At the loss of everything he owns Job "did not sin by charging God with wrongdoing" and, after the loss of his health, Job "did not sin in what he said."

Then, his friends begin to eerily echo the words of the serpent in Genesis:

[Eliphaz speaks-]

A spirit glided past my face,
    and the hair on my body stood on end.

It stopped,
    but I could not tell what it was.
A form stood before my eyes,
    and I heard a hushed voice:[...]

'If God places no trust in his servants,
    if he charges his angels with error[...]

Are not the cords of their tent pulled up,
    so that they die without wisdom?’

At that, a closer ring of relationships are broken. 

Later, after he's afflicted with every milady except death, his own wife encourages him to "curse God and die." Now, all of his most intimate relationships have been severed, and he begins to question God, asks many of the deep questions of life, and even curses the day of his birth: 

“Why is light given to those in misery,
    and life to the bitter of soul,

to those who long for death that does not come,
    who search for it more than for hidden treasure,

who are filled with gladness
    and rejoice when they reach the grave?" 

I imagine that, in his grief and lack of anyone to confide in, he does the only thing he can. He yells at God, the only one left. As the textbook definition of rock bottom, I'm sure the silence and isolation Job feels is deafening. As a nurse, I've seen people who have suffered less and still Job's question has come to my mind on occasion.

Still, unlike when God spoke to Elijah in the gentle whisper, after all that Job has endured, God appears forceful in his answer and, like his questioning of Adam and Eve, gets to the heart of the issue like a knife.

 

Then the Lord spoke to Job out of the storm:

“Brace yourself like a man;
    I will question you,
    and you shall answer me"

In so doing, God seeks to right the first and most important relationship in anyone's life, that of God and his individual creation. He doesn't mince words, he doesn't dilute or diminish it by asking the hearer (Job) to turn or cover his face. He even warns Job that He's going to tell him how-it-is and then force an accounting, an answer, no choice, no hiding in the garden of Eden.

[Then Adam (guarded by a fig leaf) replied to the Lord:]

“I heard you in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid. [...] The woman you put here with me—she gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate it.” 

In God's mercy, Job refuses to blame his wife and answers God with none of Adam's excuses and denials:

Then Job replied to the Lord:

“I know that you can do all things;
    no purpose of yours can be thwarted.[...]

Surely I spoke of things I did not understand,
    things too wonderful for me to know.[...]

My ears had heard of you
    but now my eyes have seen you.

Therefore I despise myself
    and repent in dust and ashes.”

With Job's personal relationship with God back in order, God begins to move in the background and right Job's outer relational-rings: 

[God  speaks to Eliphaz]

 “I am angry with you and your two friends, because you have not spoken the truth about me, as my servant Job has... My servant Job will pray for you, and I will accept his prayer and not deal with you according to your folly.”

To Eliphaz's credit, he obeys God, rights his relationship with the Almighty, stops conveying the message of the shadowy figure, and then asks for Job's prayer... and Job consents.

"After Job had prayed for his friends, the Lord restored his fortunes and gave him twice as much as he had before."

In this instance, Job's restoration appears to hinge on Eliphaz's personal obedience and Job's blind acceptance of his friends' public offering of regret. Does the idea that someone else's restoration may be riding on your obedience make you uncomfortable? I think it's meant to.

Next time you sin toward someone (even if well or unintentioned), don't hide behind the fig-leaf and wait for God to come calling for you. Gird yourself like a man. Obey and ask for forgiveness like Eliphaz; don't give excuses like Adam.

If anyone asks you for forgiveness, man up like Job (I doubt you have it worse), and extend obedient forgiveness. Don't point fingers, like Adam, at the very relationships and circumstances that you have been blessed with.

It is also worth noting that Job never gets his first children back; he still has to deal with his grief and real hurt, but he does so with the confidence that his relationships have now been righted and confirmed.

“Naked I came from my mother’s womb,
    and naked I will depart.
The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away;
    may the name of the Lord be praised.”

All the rest flows from that.

My Oldest and I

She's the one with the quick and quiet wit that waits in line for the right moment to strike and comes out swinging for the fences only to retreat back into her shell with a blushing smile and a glint in her eyes that tells me she is proud and pleased with what she's done and the reaction that she saw register on my face. 

Two years waiting for her to take root and grow, it seemed I already knew her when she came out and grabbed my finger for the first time, wrapped around my finger and my heart.

My second love. I read to her; I played with her before she was born, a game of run and tag, her foot kicking at the light I used to tease her with against her mother's stomach. Her heat permeated anyone she touched enticing them to be the cushion that she slept on, contoured memory foam for her to grow on, she had her pick of human mattresses to protect her as she napped.

Whatever she wanted, she got. Not to spoil her or to make excuses for a lack of attention or to excuse or cajole behavior, but to see her smile and squeal, her eyes light up with joy that someone thought of her and knew just what she wanted. It wasn't hard; she never hid it. You just had to give her clothes to deconstruct and rebuild into her world.

Even at six, she lived for expression, in fashion, in school, in paint, and dance. Her cloths, her socks, they never matched. Why should they? She rejected the matches others made (she didn't know them) and made her own. Intensely loyal and acutely attuned to others'  feelings, she cried for others' pain and stood up for the rejected, sometimes sobbing in the car on the car ride home. She didn't even match her friends, but they still flowed together.

Her parties rocked and she would float between the groups of dance, or school, of church, of camp: lace, books, glasses, and camo. From movies under the stars, make-up in the room, and stages built to dance on, move on, she shined with everyone on whatever stage we built for her and put her on.

I've danced with her. It was best at the "princess balls," costume required. I was her prince, the king, and dinner date before dancing on the floor to music way too loud for both our ears. The first time, she danced with me alone and held my hand when friends came. A circle would ensue; we'd dance together. A hop with fervor in the air. I was still the stage she clung to.

With confidence came willingness to leave me for a while, short trips that soon got longer as the years went by and now I stand and watch her celebrate with friends away from me, but always with an eye to see me there, see me watching, still close enough to see her need should it arise, a visible anchor if she falls.

This year she asked me something different, She wanted me to blend in with the other dads who never seem to go-all-out. They where their suits and stand by the wall sipping beer and chatting to themselves, ignoring all around them: an illusion for her friends or maybe for her own new found sense of adventure, the need to venture out. She asked it to my wife, the sounding board, the go-between, to see if it would stick. I was crushed and she quickly changed her mind, but I've watched her dance, her own creations on the stages of her choosing.

I no longer match her style. I'm no longer the visible protector, partner, father, front-stage-participant, but that's okay. I know which way she's headed. My second love is looking for her independent place, the same one I gave her the confidence to take.

She still knows I'm there. I remind her. I tell her I love her... watching, blending, and waiting should the need arise. 

Daily Pills and Shame

At six, I rode my first bike. My ever-so-slightly younger brother was already gliding the pavement without his training-wheels and I was the one left behind. motivated by shame, I vowed to catch-up and allowed my dad to teach me. I learned quick when he let go at the top of a local hill that had just been tar-and-chipped. The immanent fear of danger was a quick and efficient teacher.

At seventeen, I drove my first car. My girlfriend had started college and my friends had figured out I didn't like to pay for gas. Their was no way I was going to get caught riding the bus as a high-school upperclassman. A weeks worth of trips on the same bus as the freshman and having to get up an hour earlier to do it proved to be the breaking point for my reluctance to get a part time job and begin paying for car insurance. Again, shame drove me to take the next step in my life. 
 
As a nurse working on a hospital's chronic heart floor, I see the effects of shame. Older women who are afraid to admit they can no longer cook for themselves and end up sending their sodium and sugar levels through the roof with microwave dinners. Older men who refused to use a walker or a cane until they fell down the stairs and broke their pelvis. No one wants to admit that they may be suffering from the worst parts of getting older, dependance and physical decline. 

Today, the doctor told me what I had already known. My blood pressure is getting too high. Most of the patient's I take care of would be happy to have my numbers, but I know that the sixty-five year old I take care of during the day probably had borderline numbers like me when he was my age. What kept them from taking care of their systolic business in the 1980's? Aside from lack of information, I'm guessing it was shame. Ignorance may be bliss, but the next best thing is a good show for the rest of them. Right? 

I've seen the ravages of heart disease and high blood-pressure. I've seen proud men drown in their own fluids, their lungs filled up past the first lobe. I've seen women stroke out with a systolic pressure above 240, despite headaches, multiple visits to the ER with chest pain, and difficulty breathing. When I have time, I ask them when they started getting mild symptoms, when they noticed it (and started ignoring it); it's almost always in their 30's and early 40's. They started killing themselves in their 30's!

So, at thirty-four, I've taken my first blood pressure pill and hope the small monthly investment pays bigger dividends thirty years from now despite the shame and the admittance of the inevitable, my body isn't perfect and neither am I. They always say it's the first step. Next step, the right foods and exercise... I'm not there yet. 

Chronic Stress: How to Cope in a Down Economy (Part 1)

The following is the first part in a series on how small businesses can reduce chronic stress in the workplace.

They may lurk in a back office hazed in a ring of smoke sitting next to a cold cup of caffeine. They may be hunched over a calculator and a keyboard crunching numbers, or they may be out at the counter making sure that everything gets done “just right.” Often, they coexist with the equally anxious hired hand in charge of keeping daily operations going and the lights on. Either way, with slim pickings for profit margins and given the generally-negative economic atmosphere, is it any surprise that many small business owners and executives exhibit signs of chronic stress? With that said, what are the signs and possible symptoms of chronic stress and what is its overall impact on the viability and longevity of small businesses in the area and the health and well being of the owners and staff? Once identified, aside from buying a fishing boat and moving to the bahamas, what can be done about it?

This three part article will be an interesting read. It may even take you down memory lane and serve up a few “aha” moments that will better your life and hopefully your health. After all, a happier staff is a more productive staff and “if the boss ain't happy, ain't no one happy.” Your health and the health of your staff is the bottom line.

The disclaimer

Many people read articles like this one, see the list of symptoms, and feel the affliction known to University Clinics around the world as “Medical Student’s Disease” or at doctor’s offices as “cyberchodndria.” In that, armed with the new knowledge of possible symptoms, you begin to see them everywhere. Rest assured and take a deep breath, this article is meant to educate, not diagnose. It’s meant to help you ask questions of yourself, start conversations at work, and then take those questions to your primary care provider.

Am I covered? Wait... if you’re having chest pain signs or other signs of a heart attack, call 911 or go to the emergency room.  So, with that in mind and the lawyers off of speed dial, let’s move on.

Warning! Science Content.

In order to understand abnormal reactions to stress we must first understand our body’s normal reaction to it, which begins with a brief history lesson and some basic physiology.

Only in the last few hundred years, has mankind been able to worry more about what new iPhone app to download than about running away from large predators while looking for food. If you want an excellent primer on the subject, watch the new animated movie “The Croods” with your family. In it, the patriarch of the cave-family uses the motto “Never not be afraid.” His only job is to keep his family alive. He is big and strong and only has to react to threats. No “ideas” necessary.

Physiologically and chemically, not much has changed since the stone-age. In order to outrun the saber-tooth tiger at your heels or fight the bear at your front door, two chemicals do most of the heavy lifting and it starts in your brain.

Think of the amygdala as the alarm bell in your brain. Tucked away in the back of the medial temporal lobes of the brain, this almond sized piece of the basal ganglia is responsible for receiving perceived threat information from the frontal cortex and signaling the adrenal glands (housed atop the kidneys) to begin production of a host of hormones. Just the sight or sound of a perceived threat sets off an unconscious signaling process. Most people identify this as “getting tense” or feeling agitated, but they seldom know why.  

Enter the hormone adrenaline. If the amygdala gets the engine primed, adrenaline revs it through the gears like a Japanese drift racer. It constricts peripheral blood vessels, which decreases the possibility of limb hemorrhaging. Core blood pressure goes up, to fight possible hemorrhaging, and it takes the brakes off your SA node to increase your heart rate to pump needed fuel to running legs. If you’re not already on the run, you’ll feel your heart race, beads of sweat gather on your arms, and you’ll get a headache from too much light entering your dilated pupils.

While adrenaline recruits massive amounts of muscle fiber for fast action, the corticosteroid Cortisol feeds them by elevating the amount of glucose in your blood. It also stalls your immune system and its inflammatory response to protect muscle cells during extreme use. If you haven't been eaten or mortally wounded, the system is designed to save you and then reset itself and return the body to normal. You, however, at the cash register or on the couch after a hard days work will feel completely drained, possibly lethargic, and have no motivation to get into the sunlight you crave.  

Granted, Wolves and Vikings are negligible threats in most of Ohio, but the system still serves its purpose. Cars get pulled off of kids by superhuman moms. Trauma victims make it to the Emergency Room alive and first responders function at top gear, but what happens when the intermittent stresses of wolves, vikings, and overturned cars are replaced by the unending stress of bills and payroll? What happens if the system doesn’t reset itself?

We'll get into this next week and focus on the negative effects of chronic stress over a period of time and begin to delve into practical (and free) ways to begin to identify and combat those effects in your everyday life. In the meantime, check out the references below for more in-depth reading on the subject as your time permits.

References:

Lemonick , M. (2003, October 06). How to heal a hypochondriac. Time, Retrieved from http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1005818-2,00.html

U.S. Census Bureau. (2007). Retrieved from U.S. Census Bureau website: http://www.census.gov/econ/smallbus.html

Mayo Staff. (2010, September 11). Stress: Constant stress puts your health at risk.. Retrieved from http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/stress/SR00001

McEwen, B. S., & Mirsky, A. E. (2007). Physiology and neurobiology of stress and adaptation: Central role of the brain. Retrieved from http://physrev.physiology.org/content/87/3/873.full

My Oldest.

She's picked up a wicked "you have to know something obscure to know what I'm laughing at" sense of humor. Half the fun is watching her watching whoever it is that she's talking to. Her eyes kinda twinkle and you can see the smile on the corner of her mouth begin to twitch as the other person mulls over the obscure thought connection puzzle she's laid in front of them. She lets it go if they don't get it, but her voice dances when they do; they're in the club. They've figured out the secret handshake and cared enough to play along. I've taught her well.

Her inhibitions leave when she's on the dance floor. She owns it. She knows it.  She talks to it. Barefoot, she caresses the wooden floor, whispering with each pirouette. With her toes, she digs in and shouts a chassé, knowing the air accepts her, loves her, and the floor regains her when she's done.

The floor is the foundation of all her muscle, all her moves. It never leaves, never fails, always accepts her efforts to leave and pushes back, with equal force, to help her gain new heights in what she loves. Just enough resistance to make her strong, a trust earned since she was three. I hope I've done the same.

She notices everything, physical and emotional. Windshield wipers that go faster than ours. The movie that showed an obscure shot of the Central Park Zoo trying to pass it off as somewhere else. Seeing others bullied afflicts her physically with pain and hardens her to action. My own inner facial flinch when she does something I don't approve of makes her crumble when I leave the room. She knows me so well it scares me.

She's so much like me that it scares me. Not that I'm afraid she'll do something stupid, she will. Not that she won't be brilliant, she is. No, her burden will be an internal one, a constant struggle between introversion and the excitement of the crowd, the shy subtlety of "will you join my club" and the pure joy of performance. Her power is her weakness; her joy is high and her sorrow black, but tomorrow is always sunny. I think she'll navigate it well.